Todd, Tim and Kellan Cook love Baseball, the Seattle Mariners and trekking around the country to visit stadiums and watch games. These are their stories. #FatherSonBaseball

Speed Pitch & Blue Jays vs. Mariners (5/4/1985)

We just received a package of Christmas gifts in the mail from my folks. Tucked in the bottom of the box, my folks had stashed a little surprise from the past:

Yes, an “Official Speed Pitch Certificate” from the Kingdome.

Clicking on the picture will enlarge the certificate and display this explanatory note:

“The pitch was clocked by a Radar Gun, an instrument used to measure Major League pitchers. This speed-measuring equipment has been verified to be accurate within one percent.”

So, that’s right, as a nine year old phenom, I lit up that official “Radar Gun” at a blazing 46 miles per hour (or at least within one percent of 46 miles per hour).

I remember the old Kingdome speed pitch. It was just inside the Dome’s northern gate — just off to the right in this picture. I couldn’t heat up the gun then, and I can’t heat it up now. But its always been fun trying.

As you can see at the top of the certificate, there are a bunch of holes from where I tacked this “Official” certificate to the wall of my boyhood bedroom. You will also notice that I did my best to obliterate one of the speed pitch sponsors. I was a coca-cola drinking kid, and I didn’t want this “new generation” inspired soft drink logo muckin’ up my bedroom walls (FYI, I still prefer coke products).

Its cool to get back this little momento of past feats. But what is even cooler is getting confirmation of a random date of a game I attended in the first few years of my Mariners fandom: May 4, 1985.

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2 Comments

Todd,

Cool memory. I have recently done something similar when I found old ticket stubbs that were stashed in a box. Checked Baseball-Reference.com and looked to see the details of the game. It brought back memories that were tucked away. Glad to see that others are doing the same thing to bring back good things from the past.

KEN-
I love going through old box scores on baseball-reference.com to check out old games that I attended. I have a list that I’ve put together of old games that I attended. Its very cool to rediscover in box score format events that you once witnessed in person as a kid. My biggest old game dilemma has been trying to find a game where I saw Bo Jackson hit two homeruns at the Kingdome. The problem is that he had three two-homer games at the Kingdome during his career and I’ve never been able to figure out which one I attended.

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